


New Year

by Blue_Storm (Spillz)



Series: Zutara Month 2016 [3]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alcohol, F/M, Zutara Month
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-01
Updated: 2017-01-01
Packaged: 2018-09-13 23:51:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9147487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spillz/pseuds/Blue_Storm
Summary: The first New Year's party after the war ends is the great celebration the world has been waiting for. Everyone is full of talk of the future, but the future Katara sees stretching out ahead of her is not the one she wants.





	

It had been hard to decide where to hold the New Year's celebrations. Ba Sing Se, the Fire Nation and the Northern water tribe had all been insistent that their cities deserved the honour of hosting the first New Year’s festival. In the end, it was agreed that an Air Temple would be the best place to signify neutrality and unity.

 

Weeks prior to the festival were dedicated solely to cleaning, decorating, and setting up the Western Air Temple for the guests set to arrive for New Years. The whole team agreed that they had done a pretty good job.

All the old fountains had been cleared of blockage and the rooms had been cleaned up and remodelled. Toph and Aang had restored the crumbling parts of the huge structure and Sokka and Zuko had set up lanterns everywhere so that even in the New Moon the whole temple was lit up like midday.                   

 

The fruits of their labour were greatly appreciated when the festival came, and as many people who thanked them for their efforts in the war also praised them for such a marvellous event. Traditions from all of the nations were celebrated and no one wore their national colours for the whole three days of the festival. All of the politics were forgotten under the giddiness brought about by peacetime and wine, and soon had even the stuffiest of nobles enjoying themselves.

 

On the third and final night of the festival, Katara had her hair tied back tightly off her face and wore a yellow dress with blue arrows sewn into it. Aang had been captivated, and throughout the night everyone had commented on what a wonderful wife she would make him. Talk of bringing more air benders into the world had long since overwhelmed Katara, and she had gotten Toph to find her somewhere private to sit.

 

At the highest point of the temple, she was completely alone. Muted sounds of music and merriment still reached her, but it was as if she had dunked her head into a bucket of water. Her hairstyle had been pulling painfully on her face all night and she knew that if she kept it up another second she would burst into tears. As soft waves of light brown tresses fell freely around her shoulders she sighed her relief, but the tears still came.

 

Her sobs were silent, fueled by overthinking and too much wine, but they were as inevitable as the New Year itself. Months had passed since the war had been won; since the confusion had ended and all was as it should be. But still, nothing felt right. The tight golden sash on her outer dress dug into her ribcage as it shook with tears so she wrestled herself free of it and repurposed the fine silk as a handkerchief. Her carefully applied makeup smeared onto her sash in wet streaks, she knew there was no going back to the party now.

 

“Katara?” A voice that wasn’t a blurred mumble from floors below her snapped Katara’s head up in a second. At first, she thought that the figure in blue was Sokka, or maybe her father and she wanted nothing more than to hide her puffy eyes and send him back down to the party. But instead it was Zuko, and she knew better than to try and convince him it was nothing.

 

“Toph sent you?” It wasn’t really a question, Katara knew her friend had definitely sensed her crying and that it would only be a matter of time before someone came to find her. Zuko nodded and sat beside her.

“I don’t know why me and not Aang, but here I am”

“I’m glad it’s you,” Katara said, knowing what the implications of those words were. Zuko waited for her to go on, when she didn’t he leant against the wall and sighed.

“Do you ever feel like the future came too quickly?” He asked, Katara said nothing, but that was exactly how she felt. “I mean all this Fire Lord stuff was always so distant for me, I knew it would happen, I even hoped it would. I just thought I’d have more time. I don’t know,”

“Time to be a kid?” Katara finished, “I thought when the war ended I’d go home with Dad and Sokka and hug my Gran-Gran and be the girl I was when I left,” She said, pushing her hair behind her ears “Instead, the world is treating me like Aang’s wife; Airbender breeding stock.”

“Aang doesn’t think like that, though.”

“He doesn’t mean to, but all his plans, I’m in them but they aren’t _for_ me. He wants us to travel from Air Temple to air temple with our ten children rebuilding his culture. But _my_ culture needs rebuilding too, and I don’t want to travel the world as Aang's perpetually pregnant arm candy!” Katara spat her last words out with more spite that she had intended, but Zuko didn’t frown or disprove of her. He just nodded.

“I get it,” he said “You love Aang, and you feel like he deserves you because of what he sacrificed in the war. You want to make him happy, and it’s making you miserable.”

“Are we talking about me, or you?” Katara said. Her words flowed as freely as the wine had earlier and she was certain she would regret it tomorrow, but tomorrow was hours away. “I like Mai, and I know what she did for you but Zuko-“

“I know,” he said “How is it that we always end up in the same boat?” he asked, Katara had often wondered that. The spirit oasis, the catacombs, the Agni Kai they were together. They had both lost mothers and both found lovers through the war, and now here they were, both questioning that love together.

“I can’t marry Aang, it would make me hate him,” Katara said, leaning her head on Zuko’s shoulder

“And I can’t make Mai happy, my life isn’t the life she wants.”  Zuko sighed, stretching his legs out in front of him.

“We have to tell them,” Katara said softly “Not tonight, but soon.”

“It’s New Years, so new beginnings and clean slates all round, we can tell them and they’ll forgive us.”

“Promise?” Katara said, yawning as the previous three days began to catch up with her. Zuko said nothing for a while as if chewing over what that promise might mean. In the distance, the Fireworks of New Year's lit up the sky and the last 100 years of war and pain and struggle were officially in the past.

 

“I promise.” He said finally, taking Katara’s hand in his.


End file.
